| December 31, 2001 | Monday | Shawwal 15, 1422 |
It’s Vajpayee who needs a detour for a reality check on neighbours
To IGP, some time and sympathy: KARACHI FILE
Very silly rules
Shift these death traps!
The final round?
Is there a dagger on the other side?
IT is beginning to appear that the police culture in this crime-ridden city is changing. May be, keep your fingers crossed, for the better. A dialogue may be developing between the police and the people. No doubt the two are still in a very unequal equation. The police have all the powers; the people remain, for the most part, disenfranchized.
BALOCHISTAN’S economy is expected to get a big boost in the wake of reconstruction of Afghanistan. The world community is likely to pump in around 10 billion dollars in a decade or so for rebuilding the war-ravaged country.
A three-day international conference recently in Japan discussed the plans for reconstruction of Afghanistan. Most of the industrialised countries have pledged sizable contributions to rebuild the war-torn country. According to reports, the international community will be spending more than a billion dollars a year and it may continue for over a decade under a phased development plan.
Since Afghanistan is landlocked, the world community is expected to use Pakistani ports and sea-lanes for bringing in equipment, construction material and necessary tools for reconstruction of Afghanistan.
Afghanistan has been granted the right to use the sea routes for imports through Pakistan and the federal government has recently lifted some curbs allowing import of banned items, accelerating the pace of the reconstruction work.
Iran too had granted the same facilities to Afghanistan in the past. But, after the Taliban captured Herat and Mazar-i-Sharif in mid-1990s, it withdrew the facility in retaliation.
If Iran reopens the borders and allows imports for Afghanistan, then it will be more costly to take machinery, equipment and construction material to eastern and southern Afghanistan. Pakistan is a more friendly country, a partner in the coalition against terrorism, which offers all the attractive facilities to the international community for resuming the reconstruction work inside Afghanistan.
On the contrary, India is in a disadvantageous position due to the strategic location of Pakistan and its long and unending borders with Afghanistan.
Pakistan has over 2,500km long border with Afghanistan. From Malik Siah Koh to Waziristan in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas is the border with Balochistan, which is around 1,400km long. Most of the human settlements are close to the Pakistani borders in Balochistan and the NWFP, where massive reconstruction work will be undertaken.
India, Iran and Russia are left with the option to offer bids for contract for reconstruction work in northern Afghanistan. Iran may be the serious contender for contracts in western Afghanistan, mainly in Herat and its adjoining provinces.
Besides Quetta and Peshawar, there are dozens of cities and townships close to the Afghan borders, from where the skilled work force is available in sizable number.
The Balochistan government has declared that it would provide all possible help to the Pakistani firms interested in participating in the reconstruction work or offering bids in Afghanistan. Senior Minister Agha Abdul Qadir Baloch told Dawn that the provincial government would help the Pakistani companies fetch contracts.
Close tribal relations, languages and the intimate inter-action between the peoples of Afghanistan and Pakistan are the added advantages for the Pakistani firms seeking contracts in that country. Pakistan can deploy a huge work force for the reconstruction.
Independent economists feel that spending around one billion dollars or more a year is a lot of money for rebuilding Afghanistan and would give a boost to economic activities in the whole region, mainly areas close to Afghan borders. Most of the supplies will be routed through Balochistan and Frontier.
As Quetta is the traditional route for overland transit trade to Afghanistan, mainly the southern parts of the country, the traders, suppliers and others are expecting a big economic activity in coming months. Most of the importers and traders of Afghanistan have their offices and establishments in Quetta and other townships and they could facilitate the economic activities.
It is in addition to the routine transit trade facility enjoyed by Afghan and Pakistani traders and business people. Spin Boldak and Wesh townships right on the border have been the biggest outlets of goods to different directions in recent past, even under Taliban.
Large warehouses and a network of business houses will facilitate the Pakistani firms for supplies in reconstruction work.
Necessary diplomatic presence of Pakistan in Kabul, Herat, Kandahar and Jalalabad is a must for helping the Pakistani companies fetch the contracts. The local officials are from the same stock of people having a soft corner for Pakistan and its people. Most of the Afghan leaders remained in Pakistan and during their prolonged stay, they developed close relations with the people here. Afghan leaders considered Pakistan as their second home since the overthrow of monarchy by Sardar Daud in early 1970s and the government should avail this advantage by participating in the reconstruction work in a big way.
INDIA’S decision to ban Pakistani planes from its airspace has given President Pervez Musharraf a great opportunity to take a detour to Kathmandu.
If he is not in an avoidable hurry to accept the one-time grudging reprieve by New Delhi to use its air corridor, General Musharraf ought to consider two flight routes, both very promising and high-yield journeys from any diplomatic angle you may wish to consider. And he should take along a notepad on which he scribbles his detailed observations along the fascinating non-India route.
His findings will be of interest to many bemused Indian citizens who do not know why they are not popular in their neighbourhood. The notes will be of immense help to General Musharraf’s estranged friend, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, who is also afterall a bemused Indian. And even if they do not end up in a warm embrace in Kathmandu, Gen Musharraf should try to slip the notes quietly into Vajpayee’s hand anyway.
If the President of Pakistan chooses the southern circuitous route to the landlocked Nepal,he would be doing himself a big favour if he also took a little time off from the immediate trajectory to Colombo, to fly over the Maldives, the smallest member of the troubled club of seven-member Saarc nations.
In his exchange of greetings with President Gayoom, he should find out why India behaves the way it does with its neighbours. There was a time when India’s links with the remote Indian Ocean archipelago was really close, as seen from the relics of its Buddhist past. More recently Indian commandos actually helped the Male government survive a devastating attack when in 1988 a coup attempt involving Sri Lankan mercenaries was foiled with the prompt help of New Delhi.
With so much to owe to India, why does the Maldives not even have an ambassador in New Delhi, particularly when it has one in neighbouring Sri Lanka? Why there are no direct flights between Male and New Delhi? Why does the Maldives feel closer to, say, Saudi Arabia than to its older friend?
The findings will interest Mr Vajpayee, hemmed in otherwise by aides with narrow domestic agendas.
A few minutes later, flying over Colombo, President Musharraf will discuss with President Kumaratunga Sri Lanka’s defence efforts against what she calls Tamil terrorism.
After all he only recently opened a modest line of credit for Colombo’s war effort when India, in the immediate vicinity, had expressed its inability to do much in that regard.
General Musharraf would be taken into confidence about how India has not kept its word on some key promises on trade liberalization with its smaller neighbours.Flying over Colombo General Musharraf would also notice Israeli Kfir warplanes, Chinese and Russian planes too and even some American military units training the Sri Lankan army to fight a good battle, but no Indian presence of any significance.
Leaving the shores of Sri Lanka over the harbour of Trincomalee, General Musharraf might reflect on what India must do to gain the trust of Tamils as well as the Singhalese majority. This trust has been frittered away despite India having effectively helped save not one but two governments in Colombo from two different kinds of “ terrorism”, Singhalese extremists as well as Tamil.
As he approaches the coastline of Bangladesh, General Musharraf will sea the azure sea off the western flank of Myanmar. A thought may cross his mind, which could have serious implications for his country too. Was it a deliberate act of provocation by India to have tested an upgraded Prithvi missile precisely when Chinese President Jiang Zemin was recently visiting Rangoon?
He won’t have too much time to think about that troublesome scenario though. The next air corridor for the presidential plane is already over Bangladesh.
Begum Khaleda Zia is perceived here as closer to Pakistan than she is to India. And therefore some religious and ethnic issues will be seen messing up their ties. But then why even the relatively pro-Indiagovernment of Begum Hasina Wazed, the quietly raging anti-India sentiment in Bangladesh had flared into a brutal massacre of Indian border guards.
Does a country that has virtually “liberated” its smaller neighbour from another, as some Indians boast to have done with Bangladesh, deserve to be so misunderstood? Why? General Mohammed Ershad, host of the first Saarc Summit held in Dhaka in 1985, had told me that the idea behind getting the seven countries together was because six of them were allergic to India.
If General Musharraf can come up with an antidote to this allergy without tormenting India any further, it would go a long way in cementing his shaky ties with Mr Vajpayee.
Flying over Bhutan, on his way to Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport, General Musharraf would be able to see the world’s tallest peak. He will see that Mount Everest, which can be seen as large as life on a clear day from any plane flying over Bhutan, is really not in India, as some of us were erroneously taught in school, but is divided between Nepal and Chinese Tibet. (I think the error crept in because of Allama Iqbal’s reference to the highest mountains of the world guarding India’s northern limits like a sentry).
With a closer zoom into the lower reaches of Bhutan, he could also find some Assamese “terrorists” of the anti-India Ulfa group hopping across the porous mountain borders with facility. Mr Vajpayee would be interested in finding out all about that.
A little to the north, and he would be over Chinese territory. But if he had to use Chinese territory in the first place, why couldn’t General Musharraf fly over Afghanistan, then over China and into Nepal?
This way he would be able to see the ravages caused by American bombing of the country where he had helped shore up a medieval government not so long ago. Will the bombings help his neighbour come out of its time warp or have they pushed Kabul further into a ditch?
Here General Musharraf will experience the lessons that usually apply to India in most other instances — that living with a smaller, weaker neighbour brings its own problems, serious problems.
If he then goes straight to China from Afghanistan, Gen Musharraf will probably fly close to the Shaksgam Valley, a place out of this world which his country had taken as part of its claim on Kashmir but had later ceded to China.
Mr Vajpayee had resurrected this virtually dead issue quite mysteriously recently when he was recounting his meeting with President Musharraf in Agra before the Indian parliament.
It seems the Pakistani president has promised to get the land back from China provided there is a discussion towards a solution to the Kashmir issue. There has been no word on the Shaksgam Valley issue ever since from any of the three sides involved, except that Pakistan and China have both denied such a discussion took place in Agra.
General Musharraf will not want to embarrass Mr Vajpayee by recalling the angry Chinese reaction, not very different from the rest of the world’s, to the tit-for-tat nuclear tests of 1998 by India and his own country.
He will want to put behind him also New Delhi’s shockingly bleating complaint to Washington about China being the cause of the tests. It was one of the most embarrassing experiences for Indians when President Clinton went to Beijing afterwards only to declare that China would henceforth be responsible for the stability of Asia.
When General Musharraf does touch down at the highly protected Kathmandu airport, he must try to figure out who within his ISI intelligence agency, as charged by India, could have helped the bunch of pro-Pakistan terrorists, or perhaps Pakistani citizens themselves, to hijack an Indian Airlines plane from that very airport, an event that ended in the humiliating release of Maulana Masood Azhar in Kandahar.
If he already has the answer to the identity of the hijackers, General Musharraf may want to punish those involved. That would help, with India and the United States too. However, there are other anti-India activities raging in Nepal. Was Pakistan involved also in the anti-i-Hritic Roshan demonstrations across the Himalayan kingdom?
If so, Pakistan has to make the right amends for the future. But then in the not too distant past was it not India that had alienated Nepal with a crippling trade embargo on the landlocked country? Could that be a symptom if not the explanation of the current rage against a country whose relations has noth been been smooth even otherwise although travelling between them has never required a passport or a visa. General Musharraf could bring all these sharp and clear sentiments in the neighbourhood to the notice of Mr Vajpayee.
Finally, even as he unfastens his seatbelt, General Musharraf must not forget to note down for the record that the recent Indian moves against his country, that forced him to take a circuitous route to Nepal (if only for the sake of this piece), have come after serious provocations against New Delhi, by whoever was responsible. He has a great chance now to be the first among India’s neighbours to help the largest country in the region to unshackle itself from the scourge of demeaning hyphenated relationships with virtually each of its smaller neighbours.
On the other hand Mr Vajpayee too must realise that a looming war can be averted not by listening to his Bharatiya Janata Party and the hysterical Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, but by holding the hand of General Musharraf.
That is the least both need to do, hold hands. Because the next war will not bring with it mere political embarrassments over how relationships are finally punctuated, but one that will come with the full force of an unthinkable nuclear catastrophe.
And when that happens, there will be no handy full stops around, nor hyphenations, to be of any use, of any help, to anyone if anyone is still around.
To some extent this dialogue has begun. The present police chief is a better communicator. He is easy and candid while in contact with the Press, that is with the people. This is a fresh trend and, as far as it goes, could be refreshing.
Today is the last day of the year 2001. Thanks to the IGP, we have some idea of how we in this city fared during the outgoing year. Pretty infamously. One short of 60 people were gunned down in ‘sectarian killings’. That makes just about five a month. Let us have the moral courage to admit that a murder in this class is not the offence as defined in Section 302 of the CrPC.
Sectarian killing is no mundane crime. It is not prompted by any earthly urge, like kidnapping for ransom. Kidnapping is a straightforward enterprise to make money, quick money, big money. Sectarian killing is in the name of the Creator, the Giver of life. The killer believes he is accomplishing a divine mission for which there is a divine reward. Note also that in our Islamic republic, sectarian killing has to be Muslim killing Muslim. Period.
This crime and its horrifying incidence ought to make us think. More important, to look into our hearts and souls. Why should a Muslim be killing a fellow Muslim who has done the killer, or anyone else, no harm whatsoever? When a human being murders because he has been wronged or robbed (of money, woman, honour etc.), he has a human and personal motive, urge, explanation or excuse, however brutal. Some murders do get excused on the grounds of overwhelming provocation.
What is the chemistry of sectarian killing? Who these killers are, where they are born and bred? Broadly speaking, these approximate to our idea of the Taliban. It would be futile hair- spitting to distinguish between our Taliban and the Afghan Taliban, now trounced. The Taliban were and remain a cult that knows of no borders, surely none between our Islamic Republic and the Islamic Emirate of the Afghans.
Karachi has a very substantial Taliban presence. Some in this city believe they outnumber any other non-local elements. This could well be true because Karachi and its neighbourhoods are home to the largest concentration of the ‘deni madaris.’ Not everything about these institutions is in public knowledge. The government seems to know even less. Our minister of the interior talks of these schools in a patronizing, even affectionate, tone. For the average educated citizen, these madaris are the nurseries that raise the Taliban battalions. The name Taliban gives much of this game away. It is a student force. This presupposes schools, the madaris, does it not?
The huge Taliban processions and ‘wheel-jam’ strikes simply point to the madaris, offering a big supply of trained agitators at the shortest possible notice. They would burst into Karachi’s wide streets virtually from the blue and hold the city hostage. The more hardened are, for all we know, the volunteers ready to kill, and also to die, should that be the divine will.
This is the story in brief behind those 59 killings officially designated as ‘sectarian.’ It is reassuring to hear the IGP say the CID is now set to keep an eye on these elements. However, the question that still needs an answer is why this brain wave so late in the day? Why was the CID not mobilized earlier on this front? One probable answer is that the governments had a soft corner for the Taliban.
This is no secret. Benazir Bhutto’s home minister was one of the patron saints of the early Taliban. The Taliban generalissimo was put on top of our foreign office by the BB. Doesn’t that sound great —- PPP chief a Talibanophile!
We have another set of statistics which is mystifying, putting it mildly. We are told about sectarian killings in fairly precise terms. That’s of course good. So, of the 35 registered cases (of sectarian killing), 17 were “worked out.” Let us hopefully suppose these cases were sent up for trial. This makes less than 50 per cent of the 35 registered, as we know about 17 and do not about 18.
Also note the gaps: 59 killings, 35 registered, 22 arrested. Statistics do have a way of causing mysteries. But when these relate to life and death, indeed more to the latter, the confusion carries more the smell of a mortuary than an exotic aroma.
With 59 killings, 22 arrests and 17 cases in courts what we have is something to think about very hard. So many questions remain to be addressed and answered. The new IGP needs time and he should be given time — and sympathy.
One good thing about Karachi’s Defence is that unlike the one in Lahore young single men can go to many parks without being asked to wear trousers or track suit bottoms or being turned away because they are single. Yes, in case people did not know, there are quite a few parks in Lahore where if you go wearing shorts — I mean what else would you wear if you were to go running — the guards at the gate will turn you away.
Incidentally, many parks in Clifton and Defence do not have this absurd condition — imposed in Lahore apparently because, the Defence Housing Authority in its infinite wisdom there decided that men in shorts were ‘outraging the modesty’ of the female visitors — but had modified it to require all young men to wear shorts that reach at least their knees.
The other much-frequented place in the city that has a nearly as ridiculous prohibition is The Point which every Sunday does not allow single men in after 5 pm — something that was also in place for a few days leading to Eid. The reason I call this prohibition ridiculous is that most of the young men who really want to get inside The Point have found many ways to go around this rule. Some of them go inside the mall well before the 5 pm restriction while others try to go inside with families or groups of girls, most of whom readily oblige them.
In any case, this sort of forced segregation will only make frustrated and desperate young men (that is the supposition here, isn’t it?) more desperate. Part of this has to do with the fact that they often can’t deal with women, so the more they interact with members of the opposite sex the lower will be their level of frustration/desperation. This 5 pm restriction also means that young single men like me cannot go to this place even if they have a valid reason like meeting someone, buying something or getting something to eat.
The opposite of this happens at the Karachi Zoo every year, something that one would have hoped would have ended by now. In a (very bizarre) attempt to ensure that women are not harassed during what probably is the busiest time of the year, the zoo administration decided in its infinite wisdom to ban their entry during the Eid holidays. Now there can be nothing more absurd than this. Why should women suffer just because men can’t keep their hormones in check? Who comes up with such silly rules?
The mood was festive with a tinge of sadness at the Goethe Institut last week when many had gathered at a reception to bid farewell to outgoing director Dirk Angelroth and welcome his replacement Marla Stukenberg.
Here since April 1998, Mr Angelroth will be leaving for Austria, his wife Hixe’s country. People who frequent the Goethe-Institut or are somehow associated with it had grown quite close to the jolly director and his sweet wife in these past three years or so. The highlight of the farewell was a somewhat longish speech by the director, but it had quite poignant side to it. This was the outgoing director’s last posting and he was about to retire, and it was the new head’s first posting — a sort of generational change if you will.
Many artistes, writers, poets and some of your wanna-be intellectuals were invited to the reception, which thankfully was held on a day when the weather had decidedly taken a chilly turn. A pretty good prank was played by a budding actor Ali Saleem on many of the guests presents after an announcement was made that someone was on the line from London to bid farewell to Mr Angelroth. And on came, many thought for quite some time, none other than the absconding ‘Mohtarma’. She said she was feeling very cold and lonely in London and was sorry to see...no... hear her dear friend Dirk leave. That’s why she had called. She wanted to say how much she will miss him and how much she missed her country and how much she wanted to escape from the cold and return to Pakistan. However, a look around the shamiana covered garden and I saw this youngish looking man speaking into the mike and he in fact was doing the impression, probably one of the most authentic ones I have seen.
The new director, Marla Stukenberg, who holds a doctorate in political science, told me that she was very interested in the history of the Subcontinent. She said she was particularly interested in the history of the Sikhs, and hoped that under her tenure the Goethe-Institut would be able to do some useful work. One feels that the Germans, as opposed to the British or the French (the Americans have completely stopped doing anything worthwhile in Karachi), have often organized events with a more serious and scholarly bent. Ms Stukenberg will formally take over in February.
One would assume that with the current government, and the local head honcho known to be quite a liberal man, New Year celebrations will be quite vigorous this year. Apparently, the place to be tonight is the MALC event, being organized at a private residence in Defence.
Apparently, the do is not a ball as such and there is no specific dress requirement. Seating arrangements are not in the form of tables and instead groups of sofas have been bunched together where revellers will be able to sit down. Seating arrangements for around 500 guests have been made though 800 or so tickets have been sold. Since this is one of the few major events happening tonight, many who couldn’t get tickets initially or were just plain lazy have been frantically trying to arrange tickets, with some offering double the actual price.
Other than this, there are bound to be quite a few private parties. However, the majority of the city’s young people will probably find their way towards Seaview and hopefully the police and local administration will not interfere too much and let these people enjoy themselves — since they don’t really have a choice to do much else.
One advice that Karachian would like give: please don’t drink and drive, since the last thing you want at the start of a new year is to run over someone or smash your car.
And yes, a happy new year to all of you.
It was good to see the president standing on stage and clapping along with Junoon on the Quaid-i-Azam’s birthday. Some might say that this is probably the best publicity the group has had in a while but let’s not forget that they just returned from playing at the United Nations and earlier this month an hour-long documentary about them was aired by leading music channel VH-1.
The event itself, shown live on television, did have its lighter moments. For example, after the president ended his very blunt and much-appreciated speech, there was considerable applause but not many people had gotten up to clap. However, a few ministers in the front row, led by Abbas Sarfaraz and Shahida Jamil — both applauding quite energetically — did stand up, and slowly all the others followed. In the end, everyone gave the president a standing ovation.
As for the ‘sing-along’ with Junoon, even the president’s security detail seemed to have been taken by surprise by his sudden walkabout. Some other senior officials — the corps commander, the minister for culture and sport and some assorted hangers-on — also stood on stage and tried to clap in a most wooden fashion, unlike of course the president who seemed to be doing everything quite spontaneously.
And just to think of it, the previous government had more or less banned this band from television. —By Karachian
There are two ‘DAs’ functioning in Islamabad: CDA and WAPDA (Capital Development Authority and Water and Power Development Authority). There is no doubt about their wielding authority over the awam (people) but it is at times puzzling as to which one has authority over the other. I have come across several instances of potential danger to the public caused by this dichotomous situation, one of which is illustrated by the accompanying photographs.
Sector G-10/4 has a double road (Soan Road) running through it, separating it from G-10/1. On this road is situated the Federal Government College for Women, accessible through a large iron gate installed in the college boundary wall.
Between the boundary wall and Soan Road is the footpath, or rather what is meant to be a footpath. In fact it is more like a hurdling course for preparing our athletes for the forthcoming SAF Games which were to have taken place in Islamabad from October 6 to 15, 2001.
There is a big difference between hurdling as stipulated in SAF Stars Quiz Guide and hurdling on this course. Whereas in international hurdling, women are required to leap only 2 feet and 6 inches, the hurdles you see in the first photograph vary in height from 3 feet to 7 feet, and the distance between the hurdles is grossly inadequate even for a monkey to clear them. Since it is a women’s college, this is absolutely unfair if they are to use the footpath.
There are, however, two bigger handicaps. Firstly, the moment they emerge from the college gate and turn on to the footpath, they are confronted with a hurdle that is dangerous to life and limb: a yawning manhole down which a human body can plunge with ease much before reaching the first hurdle.
Secondly, while the regulation athletes’ hurdles are quite safe, an accidental collision with one of these hurdles might cause contact of the hurdler with a stray wire carrying 12000 volts of electricity. Then a hideous crackle of burning flesh ... brrr! Let’s not think of it!
Thus the safest way to reach home after college hours is to go around the hurdling course. Not even past the hurdles, some of which are wide enough to take up almost three-quarters of the width of the footpath. And how does one go around the hurdles? Obviously walk from the college gate on to Soan Road, go around the hurdles and mount the footpath. Simple. Except of course for one minor hitch: it’s a busy road and traffic whizzes past the gate in both directions. There is a possibility of a slight mishap occurring. Slight only for the bus flying past but not for the poor student making a micro-second’s misjudgment in stepping back to safety.
CDA and WAPDA! With the world well into the 21st century and Pakistan qualified as a nuclear power since Chaghai, don’t you two authorities possess enough technical and scientific know-how so as to shift these lethal gadgets from their present position into the huge compound of the college? The girl who might one day leave this world prematurely could be one of yours. For God’s sake, have a heart!—N.A. Bhatti
India is holding the world, in general, and Pakistan, in particular, to ransom with its war cries. What is it demanding in return for not carrying out its threat? Maulana Masood Azhar, the chief of Jaish-i-Mohammad! Yes, the same man whom India released almost to date two years ago in return for the passengers of an Indian airlines which was hijacked by as-yet-unknown Jihadis and taken to Kandahar!! It was a highly humiliating episode for India. Much more than what it had faced in Kargil. In degree, of course, Kargil’s humiliation for India was almost equal to the humiliation Pakistan had suffered at the hands of New Delhi when in the late 1980s it had walked into the ‘no man’s land’ in Siachen Glacier to achieve a strategic upper hand on Pakistan. But that too was nothing compared to the humiliation Pakistan had suffered at the hands of India in 1971 when it exported terrorism to the then East Pakistan to turn a civil war into a war of independence. Or even before that when in 1948 the Indians tricked the then ruler of princely state of Kashmir, an overwhelmingly Muslim state, to accede to India on a technicality but against the very principles of partition. So, the two countries have been trying to humiliate each other since partition itself. In the process they have gone to war four times — in 1948, 1965, 1971 and 1999.
Maulana Masood Azhar had vanished from the Kandahar airport and then not long after he surfaced one fine morning in his native Pakistan and resumed his Jihadi activities. This added insult to the Indian injury. And when his Harkatul Ansar was listed as a terrorist organization by the US he blatantly launched a new one and called it Jaish-i-Mohammad (JM). This is the organization which India is accusing along with Lashkar-i- Tayyaba (LT) of being involved in the terrorist attacks on the Indian parliament on December 13 and earlier on the legislative assembly of Indian held Kashmir. This attack is being treated by India as the greatest of all humiliations it has so far suffered at the hands of Pakistan. And now India is all set to impose a war on Pakistan to avenge this humiliation. The US seems to have accepted the Indian charges and listed JM and LT as terrorist organizations. Pakistan on its part has closed the offices of these organizations and arrested Masood Azhar along with 50 militants. Hafiz Saeed of LT has withdrawn from his party and launched a new one. But this has not impressed India. It insists on more ‘concrete’ actions which in effect means handing over of Azhar Masood to New Delhi. Pakistan is resisting the pressure and asking for ‘concrete’ proof of the involvement of JM and LT in the attack on the Indian parliament. India says it does not want to share the evidence directly with Pakistan but claims it has given the proof to the US and other friendly countries.
What does India actually want? Does it want to annihilate Pakistan to avenge its humiliation of December 13? Or does it want to capture some prized Pakistani territory and use it as a bargaining chip to get Pakistan to repudiate cross-border terrorism? Or perhaps it wants to terrorise Pakistan enough to get it to repudiate cross-border terrorism without having India to fire a shot? Or maybe India wants to build up so much pressure in the region that a world fearing an imminent nuclear conflagration jumps into the middle, separates the two and asks them to settle their bilateral disputes through negotiations?
Annihilation of Pakistan is not perhaps an option India would like to try because it knows that any such attempt will be met with Pakistan exercising its option of the first use of nuclear weapons. The damage that such a response would wreck on India would be so colossal that it would take New Delhi, if it escaped the nuclear attack, more than a couple of lifetimes to recoup the damage. In fact if given a choice of facing Pakistan’s nuclear attack and continuing to suffer cross-border terrorism for another 100 years India perhaps would opt for the latter. Same goes for the option of capturing a part of Pakistani territory. In this case scenario too Pakistan would be left with no option but to use the nuclear device. And the way Pakistan has behaved so far in the face of extreme provocation from India, our enemy number one, it seems that Islamabad is determined not to reach for the gun unless India actually resorted to the military option but then in that case it would be a nuclear war for sure. So, what perhaps the Indians are aiming at is that if Pakistan does not reach for the gun in time then the world would come to its rescue and help her to extricate itself from the corner it has landed itself into.
And one cannot rule out the possibility of US-Indian complicity in this calculated madness seemingly on the part of India. The objective of the two is perhaps to get Pakistan to give up its material support to the on-going freedom struggle inside the Indian held Kashmir and accept an imposed Kashmir solution. The US perhaps does not want to be seen to be siding with India at this juncture after all that Pakistan has done for it in its war against terrorism. But then if it is seen to be trying to persuade the Indians to cool down in return for which Pakistan is persuaded to repudiate cross border terrorism and also hand over Masood Azhar to India then nobody losses face except Pakistan. But Pakistan too can claim victory in this as its long standing demand for third party mediation in resolving the Kashmir dispute peacefully would also have been met. And perhaps there is another face saver in the making. You take India and Pakistan to Khatmando and get them to be persuaded to do all that is needed to be done by the SAARC regional leaders in the interest of regional peace and prosperity and also in the interest of the well being of the posterity. That is why perhaps the President has offered publicly to meet Mr Vajpayee on the sidelines of the SAARC summit.
And that is why perhaps the President instead of giving his usual rhetorical answer when asked about India’s demand said the other day: We are aware of India’s demands and understand what Pakistan